By Emily Difilippo Dissertatio
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PRECARIOUS EMBODIMENTS: NARRATIVES OF DISABILITY AND BELONGING IN SPAIN OF THE CRISIS (2005-2015) BY EMILY DIFILIPPO DISSERTATION Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Spanish with a minor in Gender and Women’s Studies in the Graduate College of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 2018 Urbana, Illinois Doctoral Committee Professor Luisa Elena Delgado, Chair and Director of Research Associate Professor Dara Goldman Assistant Professor Eduardo Ledesma Teaching Assistant Professor Pilar Martínez-Quiroga Associate Professor Joyce Tolliver ii ABSTRACT Precarious Embodiments focuses upon literary and cultural production of the Spanish State between 2005 and 2015, the precarious years of the economic crisis. I examine how differences in ability as well as gender and sexual identity work together to determine the paradigm of viable citizenship in a climate of crisis. I investigate how the requirements of binary gender and heterosexuality inform the construction of the medically-approved, able body, helping to construct a “normalized” subject—an ideal citizen whose body is capable of work and full participation in society according to traditional gender roles. I examine neoliberal capitalist ideologies of productivity and self-reliance, interrogating the way these concepts are intertwined with requirements for gendered citizenship. The unifying thread of this corpus is the representation of non-normative subjects at risk of becoming superfluous to society. It is unsurprising that these figures should abound in cultural production in time of capitalist crisis. Considering that the capitalist economy itself is destined to concentrate wealth in the hands of a few, it is inevitable that some percentage of humanity will become excessive to the system, and that this percentage will increase with a stagnation of the global flow of capital. Among those most expendable are those with disabilities who cannot participate in the labor market, and caregivers of the disabled—often women—who are also barred from “productive” work. Others who lack a valued place in industrial society include women not fulfilling the role of mother and caregiver and LGBTQ people not engaged in reproductive sexuality. In reading selected narratives of non-conformity, I ask how these vulnerable individuals are either included or excluded from notions of Spanishness, attentive to the manner in which their precarious lives tell the story of the economic crisis in Spain. iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The writing of this dissertation has obliged me to understand humanity as an interdependent web of inextricable connection. I wish, therefore, to acknowledge those whose lives have been adjoined to mine during the development of this project. First and foremost, I would like to thank my advisor, Luisa Elena Delgado. The day I met you, I knew I wanted to join my intellectual life with your own. Your energy is an endless source of inspiration for me. I thank you for holding me always to the highest of standards. I wish to thank Pilar Martínez-Quiroga for giving so generously of her time and thoughts. I count you as a true friend, and I hope our conversations continue in the years to come. I thank Eduardo Ledesma for encouraging me to keep thinking and writing, to imagine new projects, and to imagine myself as a scholar. Thank you, also, for just being available to talk. I thank Joyce Tolliver for helping me to recognize the pleasures of literature and intellectual pursuit. Dara Goldman, your celebration of gender and queer theory has inspired me to approach my work in different ways. Finally, I wish to thank Javier Irigoyen, who is at once a brilliant scholar and a kind and good human being. Thank you for being a great mentor, advocate and friend to me and my fellow graduate students. Of my compañeros, I first thank Luján Stasevicius. You have helped me from the beginning to navigate the waters of graduate study, avoiding self-doubt and enjoying the journey. I thank Sarah West for her mentorship and friendship, for providing a realist perspective on academia, and for reminding me to think critically about both my scholarship and life in general. My compañeros who have been with me since the beginning occupy a particular place in my heart: Teresa Greppi, Liz Moreno, Cristina Mostacero, Amanda Rector and Juan Suárez. I will always treasure our memories together, both personal and professional. I thank Mónica Lugo for iv all her encouragement and for reminding me that that canine companionship is a key component of happiness. Samantha Good, I thank you for accompanying me in both work and leisure, and for being a model of focus and persistence. I acknowledge also my paesana abruzzesa, Jessica Sciubba, who is among the most intelligent people I have ever met, and who has a true love of the written word. Our friendship has made me feel closer to our ancestors, and I draw from their strength and wisdom. My research has taught me that the bonds of family are neither drawn by blood nor law. I remember my beloved Auntie, Elvera Stricker, who passed in the first year of my doctoral study. Because she never had a daughter, Auntie told me that when I was born, I completed her life. In a similar way, I recognize Megan Gargiulo as my first daughter—you have filled my days with laughter. The joy you take in your work and in your very living has provided me with life- sustaining hope. I thank you especially for convincing me to adopt my rescue dog, Sancho. His constant love and companionship now reminds me daily to live in peaceable communion with the earth and its creatures. Finally and most importantly, I give thanks to my mother and father, to whom I was born later in life, and unexpectedly. You have lived by example, teaching your children the ways of both industry and enjoyment. My intellectual curiosity comes from my mother, who herself is always learning, writing and creating. From my father, I know the value of service to humanity, and of finding the sacredness in all human life. I know this, too, from my husband Ted. Your care for your own mother and father in their years of disability has been my greatest example of how to treasure our loved ones. Your love for me is the reason for everything I have achieved. This dissertation project is dedicated to you. v For my husband, Theodore Glennon Ohlms vi TABLE OF CONTENTS INTRODUCTION: ........................................................................................................................ 1 CHAPTER 1: UNLIVABLE: DISCARDED BODIES IN ELVIRA LINDO’S UNA PALABRA TUYA (2005) ................................................................................................................................ 21 CHAPTER 2: MOTIONLESS: DISABILITY AND SNOW WHITE IN NARRATIVES OF THE CRISIS ......................................................................................................................................... 55 CHAPTER 3: “TODOS EN EL MISMO SACO”: DISABLITY AND THE HOUSING CRISIS IN MARTA SANZ’S BLACK, BLACK, BLACK......................................................................... 91 CHAPTER 4: POST-OP IN THE REAL WORLD: DISABILITY AND SEXUALITY IN GRAPHIC NOVEL AND FILM................................................................................................ 125 CONCLUSIONS: AWAKENING FROM A CRISIS NIGHTMARE? .....................................166 WORKS CITED..........................................................................................................................173 1 Introduction For if I am confounded by you, then you are already of me, and I am nowhere without you. I cannot muster the ‘we’ except by finding the way in which I am tied to ‘you,’ by trying to translate but finding that my own language must break up and yield if I am to know you. -Judith Butler, Precarious Life (2004) On the 15th of May, 2011, thousands of so-called “indignados” filled Madrid’s Puerta del Sol, a national center of commerce and tourism, to protest the financial and political corruption that led to the global economic crisis. The term “indignados” was popularized to refer to those who protested the austerity measures taken by the Spanish government in response to the economic crisis. This moniker was derived from a 2010 political pamphlet written by French diplomat Stèphane Hessel entitled Indignez-vous!, which also inspired the Occupy protests in the United States. By 2011, the national rate of unemployment in Spain had surpassed 20%, with the rate of youth unemployment at 46%, and these numbers were only continuing to rise, as reported by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). Cries of “no nos representan!” denounced the actions of elected officials and the failures of the Spanish democracy in meeting its responsibilities toward the citizens. Luis Moreno-Caballud observes that the global economic crisis that followed the 2008 burst of the U.S. housing bubble in fact provided a valuable opportunity to question “common sense” and “status quo” understandings of how the world operates: “una apreciación justa de la situación actual debe tener en cuenta . un generalizado cuestionamiento de las narrativas de sentido hegemónicas, que han entrado también en una profunda crisis” (536). Known thereafter as “el 15M,” the May 15 occupation of 2 the Puerta del Sol became more than merely an “indignant” protest of banks and government; communal services were set up to provide food, childcare and health care, thus re-appropriating